


Five Times Mercedes and Arnau Saved Each Other, And One Time They Didn't

by voices_of_salt



Series: The Riera Cycle [3]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Arming Teenaged Pirates With Money and Gunpowder Is A Super Excellent Idea, Childhood, Drunken Shenanigans, F/M, Farming Sucks, Fluff, Gen, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Nautical Jargon, Riera Soul-Twins, Shipwrecks, That Is A Separate Incident, This Is Not The Incident With The Hay, What Have I Done, Why Did I Write This?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-25
Updated: 2017-01-25
Packaged: 2018-09-19 19:29:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,055
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9457340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/voices_of_salt/pseuds/voices_of_salt
Summary: Sweet, silly moments from a happier time.





	1. Escape

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is totally meant to draw super-serious parallels to the Vadaen Exodus. Like, super serious. Margarida represents the difficulties of establishing sustainable agriculture in volcanic soil. It's really profound.

“Come on, Arnau! We’re nearly to the forest!”

At eleven, Mercedes was already much taller than her brother, and with all the will in the world, his short little legs simply couldn’t keep up. Arnau had, in fact, been going ever slower for the past half hour, while Mercedes was distracted by her desperate struggle for mastery with the mule. Yawning and bleary, rubbing his eyes with his fists, he looked up at her cry. He’d been near to falling asleep as he walked. But at her cry he roused himself for a final effort and sprinted after her, cherubic curls bouncing. Mercedes abandoned the mule in the middle of the dirt road and ran back to him with her arms open. Both began to smile as the distance between them closed. As they met, Mercedes swept him up and spun around, though he was really getting too big for her to pick up. But for now, she leaned back and spun him around, her heart melting at the warm, familiar weight of him in her arms. Round and round she went, until she was dizzy and Arnau was breathless from giggling. At last, she lowered him to the ground.

“We only had to hurry to get here before sunrise,” she said kindly, taking him by the hand. “Now we can leave the road and cut straight across country. Then we’ll be home before sunset. What do you think of that?”

As they walked, the first rays of sunlight peeked over the mountains, gilding the rolling fields behind them. A large villa reared up in the distance: red roof and white walls against a backdrop of dark earth. Before them, the black road curved gently down into forests of pine and oak on its way to the sea. No one was up, not yet: they still had time to get away.

“Mercè, do you think we’re going to get in trouble for this?” Arnau asked, a concerned expression on his round face. ~~~~

“Nah. If we sneak home and spend a night doing a _really_  good job mending nets, they couldn’t possibly send us back. They’ll see how good we are at helping with fishing, and they’ll never make us do this stupid, lubberly farming again.”

“Oncle Abelard isn’t a lubber.”

“No, he’s not. But it’s no work for a true pirate. Papa said that.”

“I guess so,” Arnau said, looking a little less worried.

“Anyway, now we can practice being really sneaky, right? If we cut through the forest due south rather than following the path, it’ll be like we’re the shore party of a cutting out expedition sneaking up on our prey.”

Arnau brightened at this. “Can I be the captain?”

“Of course you can! But if you’re the captain, you have to ride Margarida. That’s the rules.”

With a whoop, Arnau charged over to the mule, grabbing handfuls of the stubby mane, trying to pull himself onto her back. Margarida turned round, regarding him with an expression of equine surprise that slowly shifted to one of incipient wickedness. The mule’s tail swished, her ears angled back. Close on Arnau’s heels, Mercedes deftly scooped him up onto Margarida’s back before the mule decided to bite. ~~~~

“Ready to go, Captain Arnau?”

“Yes! Let’s go, First Mate Mercedes!”

After a minor hiccup – getting Margarida to leave the nice, easy road – they were off. Mercedes picked her way down the steep slope, skirt hiked up and tucked into her sash, clambering over volcanic boulders using all the strength of her coltish legs. Margarida plodded stolidly on behind her. And, oblivious to all danger, Arnau perched high on the mule’s back, torn between delight at his new status and the gravity expected of a responsible leader.

“Mercè, shouldn’t a good captain walk if his sailors don’t have mounts?”

“Today’s an exception,” Mercedes said authoritatively, leaping and landing in a froglike splay of knobby knees and elbows. “Because we’re escaping together.”

Arnau considered this, ducking as Margarida tried to scrape him off on a low-hanging branch.

“So you really think we won’t get in trouble?”

“Well, not  _too_  much trouble.”


	2. Fire

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Giving teenaged pirates their fair share of prize money is a terrible and amazing idea.

“Grab my hand!”

“I can’t see your damn hand!”

“It’s right here!”

Mercedes finally perceived a dim shape a few feet above her head and leapt. She caught her brother’s hand, but for a few perilous moments she hung there, toes scrabbling at the sheer wall before she found a foothold. Silently, she cursed the voluminous, furbelowed bulk of her new underskirts. If she’d settled for a few less layers, this would all be much easier.

“I’ve got you!” Arnau grunted. “Ready? One, two,  _three!_ ”

Mercedes jumped again as Arnau heaved. A frisson of terror ran through her she felt a large chunk of masonry come loose under her feet and drop away. But then she had her hand on a solid, stone waterspout, and Arnau’s strong arms pulled her up and over. They both landed sprawling on the roof of the Temple of Valkur. Far below, stone blocks crashed to the ground with meteoric force.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it: you’re still a light woman, as the foreigners say.”

“Hark at the barge calling the scow unwieldy.”

Mercedes couldn’t see her brother’s face, but she could hear his smile: “Never heard any complaints, though.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“Just one of my many irresistible charms.”

“I swear, if you hadn’t just saved me, I’d push you off the roof.”

“Well, there’s gratitude for you! I was going to ask if you wanted to go first, but now I hope my shapely backside blocks your view.”

“I could thrash your shapely backside to Isteria and back, brother dear.”

“As if! I could thrash you and all of Isteria with one hand tied behind my back.”

Still squabbling, they crept through the darkness to the far edge of the temple roof, looking down over the town square.

“Just in time,” Mercedes whispered.

In the middle of the square, a huge figure of woven wood and wickerwork towered over a constellation of surrounding bonfires. The thing’s skin was painted white, and a gruesome, carnivore’s smile slashed across its roughly-made face. “Old Albo” they called it: a strangely fond, bumbling name for so sinister a thing.

At its feet, the people of Lleida danced in rings, moving faster and faster as the pace of the music increased. The white of the wooden figure and of the dancers’ clothes showed ruddy in the firelight. Gold jewellery flashed like distant stars before being lost again in the night. Dancers and musicians sped faster and faster. The music reached unbelievable heights of complexity; the dancers’ feet flashed at a speed that could scarcely be followed. Every fibre of their beings strained with desperate, exquisite agony to follow the rhythm towards the final, tumultuous crescendo. The music reached what seemed the uttermost limit of human skill and endurance, then, implacable and irresistible as the living tide, it carried them still further. At last, in an ecstatic chaos of sound and motion, the song ended. Aching hands fell from strings. The dancers staggered, suddenly bereft of the guiding power of the musics.

Then, in the echoing silence, a procession of black-veiled  _bruixes_  marched through the crowd. Torches in hand, they sang out the old hymn. The weird, nasal whine of the ancient song echoed back from the walls of Lleida.

“Here it comes!” Arnau said, grinning and seating himself on the edge of the roof like a juvenile gargoyle. Mercedes joined him, and the two chanted along:

“ _Fire bright in flame as gold,  
Melt away the winter cold_.”

Approaching the stacked wood at the base of the huge figure, the  _bruixes_  threw their torches onto the pyre. The oil-soaked wood caught instantly, transforming in a few heartbeats to a roaring holocaust. A great vortex of swirling fire leapt up, wreathing the wickerwork vampire in smoke and flame. The crowd cheered, and a merry chaos ensued as everyone fled back from the sudden heat. From the roof the view was terrific: the ghastly figure of Old Albo nearly on their level, its terrible grin still visible in the heart of the inferno.

“Wait for it,” Mercedes said, leaning forward and staring intently at the wicker man. “Wait for it –”

Suddenly a flash of brilliant light shot up from inside Old Albo’s chest. As the flames licked higher, bright streaks like comets burst out with screeches and bangs like a broadside going off in a banshee’s den.

Arnau gave an ululating howl of delight.

“It worked!” Mercedes shouted over the din.

Below them, the crowd had recovered from its initial fright and the whole mass of brass-voiced seafarers was roaring approval at this new addition to the old tradition. By the time the fireworks died out, the square was filled with a thrum of voices as Rieras, Torrenses, Rivas, and guests exclaimed and speculated as to who was responsible.

Flushed with success and excited to claim the spotlight, Mercedes and Arnau scampered back to rear of the temple. They hurried eagerly to the edge, only to look down in some consternation into total blackness where once an only slightly impossible climbing route had been. They blinked the fire-dazzle from their eyes, but nothing grew clearer, or certainly the way down grew no clearer - the problems were very clear. Foremost among these was a particularly important chunk of temple roof, now missing, making descent impossible.

“Um, do you think we should call for help?” Arnau asked.

“No,” Mercedes said scornfully, “That would totally ruin the effect.”

“Right.” He bit his lip. “So, what do we do?”

Mercedes thought. Arnau waited.

After a while, she got up and crept along the left-hand edge of the temple roof. Arnau followed suit, searching to the right. After a long period of essentially pointless staring into the dark, they met again the middle. Silently, they both perched on the roof’s edge with their feet dangling into the darkness.

“Now what?” Arnau asked.

Mercedes looked down at her bare feet, swinging idly over black, empty air. She sighed.

“I don’t know.”

The she looked down again, down at her new clothes: layer upon extravagant layer of linen underskirts, elaborately ruffled and embroidered to be the envy of every girl in Lleida. The embroidery was in the finest Vilar style: shining silken thread, stitched so densely that it the luminous patterns appeared to be woven rather than sewn. The finest needles of Isla Ausar had worked for months to produce it - each layer more exquisitely beautiful than the last. One showed black volcanoes belching flame, another red roses and bloody vendetta blades twined in thorns of gold, yet another showed a procession of waxing and waning moons casting silver reflections on a night-dark sea. Apart from the cost of the fireworks, it represented her entire share of the treasure from that Isterian galley. Admittedly, only a teenager’s share, but a common fisherman wouldn’t see so much money in a year, let alone spend it all in one profligate shower of gold.

With a sigh, she sat back on the tiles of the roof. Mercedes reached down and took a length of diaphanous linen between her hands,

“Uh, Mercè?”

“Rope.”

“Ah.” Arnau looked at the growing pile of beautiful linen strips. Then he glanced down at his new coat, cropped dashingly short. He ran his fingers over the fine wool, feeling the elegant swirls of braid looping around bright gold buttons. Slowly, he took it off and set it gently on the roof, twitching the collar straight and folding the sleeves. Arnau rested his hand on it for a moment, as if silently bidding the garment farewell, and drew his knife. “Well, we’ll need something stronger than linen to go around the waterspout.”

In the end, they were grateful for the dark. But no one at Villa Riera ever let them live down that Light Festival when they left in new clothes and came home with none.


	3. Sea

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A good landfall is one you can walk away from. A great landfall is one where you can re-use the ship.  
> Excuse the effusive descriptions, but I drew on my own unpleasant experiences in strong seas, so trust me on the details.

The wide crescent curve of the Corba – a long, barren breakwater of an island – stretched out in front of them. Against the foaming storm swell, its black, volcanic rocks showed stark and sharp. Mercedes clutched the tiller and mainsheet in white-knuckled hands as the boat raced in towards an tiny inlet amongst the jagged stone. The storm had taken them all unaware, and now their only hope was to run for shore. To run for shore, that is, and surf the  _Gavina_  high enough onto the rocks that the huge surf wouldn’t suck them back and smash the boat against the rocks. But if they went in too fast they risked shattering the little  _llaüt_  to pieces against the strand. And with every passing moment, the swell increased and the storm grew. This was their only chance, and both she and Arnau knew it.

“Hold fast!” She roared to Arnau, her head bowed against the rain and spray.

In they raced, hurtling towards the shore. The boat plunged down the trough of a wave, pursued by an advancing wall of cresting foam. Before they dropped, Mercedes caught a glimpse of the shore, only a few yards away.

The brave little boat climbed the back of the wave before them, and then the  _Gavina_ rammed onto the rock with a bone-shaking impact that knocked the wind out of Mercedes’ lungs. They’d reached land, but the instant the ship hit the shore, she knew she’d gone in too hard.

Her head snapped up in time to see the mast bend like a reed and come down with a terrible splintering crash as the ship’s back broke. The _Gavina’_ s death spasm catapulted Mercedes aft into the oncoming swell. A following wave caught her up and slammed her against the wreck. Winded, she gasped in a mix of water-and-sand that tore at her throat. Convulsing and choking, Mercedes’ hand scrabbled to seize hold of the ship’s stern, but as she reached out, the waves smashed her against it again, with unbelievable force. Stunned and disoriented, the receding wave pulled her unresisting body back into deeper waters. Riptide and raging sea tossed her like a ragdoll. At last, impelled by desperate instinct, she began to fight against the current, still dazed, but driven by a blind, animal hunger for air, and life.

She fought, struggling blindly through a chaos of foam and seawrack towards what she hoped was the surface. Mercedes was a strong swimmer, but her limbs seemed made of lead. At last, her head broke through and she opened her mouth to breathe -  just when a wall of water crashed down over her head, forcing her back into the deeps. A vision of her brother’s face floated before her darkening eyes, and she clawed upwards in one last, heroic effort.  Every fibre of her being strained with cataleptic strength towards the distant surface.  She could sense it above her, just beyond her reach. But then another wave came roaring down and she sank into the depths.

Cold. Colder, and colder. She could feel the great weight of all that water pressing down on her, driving her deeper into the depths. Yet it was almost peaceful: drifting down, down where the force of the swell was less. Mercedes could hear the muffled boom of the surf, and the eerie, subaquatic hiss of the current racing over fissures in the rock. Dimly, through the agony of her dying body, she sensed the vast, dark void of the deep sea opening up beneath her: opening, and slowly closing over her head.

Down she sank, another sacrifice to the sea that devours so many lives. 

Suddenly Mercedes’ head snapped round, her hair caught in a vice-like grip. Weakly she struggled against this new pain, but then she felt herself carried up and up, and then the water parted over her head. Mercedes was on her back, with strong arms around her, and though she was still expelling more water than taking in air, the few gasps she managed filled her battered body with a defiant, final strength. Sharp stone cut into her flailing hands, and she wrenched round to feel solid land under her feet.

“Come on, Mercè!”

With a last, galvanic effort she threw herself up onto the slanted stone beach, half-running, half-crawling, desperate to win free of the grasping water. Beside her, Arnau dropped the halyard he’d used as a lifeline and sprinted forward, seizing her hand and dragging her after him. The retreating surf sucked at their limbs, and though they fought forward with all their strength, the tremendous force of the water slowed them until they seemed trapped in a nightmare: struggling desperately, uselessly forward, but not advancing an inch, while the hungry sea drew them back into its maw. But at the uttermost ebb of the wave they broke free, running now, as a new breaker hurtled forward. They slipped and struggled up the slimy black rocks, Mercedes’ throat burning as she gasped air into her damaged lungs.

The wave broke, rushing up the beach to seize them. But they had gained just enough ground that, this time, they withstood the terrible backwards pull of the waves. At last, they had escaped beyond the water’s reach.

Arnau slipped an arm under his sister’s and, together, they staggered away from the crashing surf. A flicker of white caught Mercedes’ eye. Turning, she saw part of the _Gavina_ ’s sail, caught, fluttering against the rocks.

“Wait,” she gasped hoarsely, pointing.

Arnau ran to fetch it. Without his support, Mercedes slumped to the ground. The sharp rocks sliced her skin, the pain oddly distant. She was cold, and so, so tired. But then she felt Arnau’s arms around her again, heaving her up, and she held tight to him, clinging more desperately than she would have clung to life itself. Together, they struggled to the top of the Corba, staggering over the volcanic rock while the wind whipped at their sodden clothes. At last, they descended into the lee of the island, out of reach of the howling wind. They crept like dazed animals over the rocks, searching for a cleft or lava tube to shelter in. At last, they found a crevice big enough for both of them to squeeze inside. Even better, there was a scraggly length of driftwood across its mouth. They draped the sail over it, weighing the edges down with the largest rocks they could force their frozen hands to carry.

No one would have recognised it as any kind of tent, but the pair crawled gratefully into the protected space. They struggled out of wet clothing and wrung salt-water from hair with shaking hands. Then, naked and bruised, they huddled shivering together in the tiny shelter.

For a long while, they sat in silence, too numbed with shock to speak. Outside, the surf boomed louder as the storm began to blow in earnest.

At last, Mercedes spoke in a harsh, rasping voice: “You saved my life back there.”

“Of course I did. I’m your brother.” Arnau smiled weakly. “Imagine what Mama would’ve done to me if I hadn’t.”

“Come on, Arnau, don’t fuck around,” Mercedes said, then coughed painfully at the irritation to her damaged throat. Arnau patted her ineffectually on the back until she batted him off, continuing in a rough whisper: “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” he said, giving her shoulder a squeeze.

They fell silent. Mercedes swallowed, remembering the awful finality of sinking down into the dark that last time.

Arnau squeezed her shoulder again, sensing her thoughts.

“Hey, you saved both of us; I couldn’t have skippered us into that beach like that.”

Exhausted, Mercedes leant her head against his chest.

“Oh, I’m sure you could’ve managed a much more spectacular catastrophe, given time.”

“Thanks,” he said, enfolding her in his arms. “You look fucking terrible, by the way. Like you fought the beach and the beach won and took half your face.”

“I love you, asshole,” she said, shutting her eyes and letting the familiar rhythm of his heartbeat drown out the storm.

Arnau held her tighter, bending to bury his face in her damp hair. Outside, the wind screamed, and waves thundered against the rocks.

“I love you too.”

 

When their parents finally found them, they were asleep in their makeshift shelter. Still naked, the two of them lay curled close as they might have been in the womb if they'd been twins of blood rather than spirit.

Cecilia Domonova collapsed into her husband’s arms, her iron self-command shattering when she finally saw them alive with her own eyes. Raül Riera held her close, great sobs wracking his body. Tears of pride mingled with tears of joy, running down his weatherbeaten face: only great skill could have saved his children. The thought that he hadn’t failed as a father – that the few skills he truly had to pass on had been enough to keep his babies alive – left him so weak that he swayed where he stood, his sailor’s balance deserting him. Only Cecilia’s embrace held him upright.

Raül looked at his youngest daughter, at his second-youngest son. Asleep, they were simply brother and sister: sharing family resemblance and nothing more. Awake, that indefinable aura of _sameness_ returned, something their father felt rather than perceived with any sense he could name. He thought of his own soul-twinned older brothers, Germà and Ramir. He looked at his children – _alive, alive, oh ancestors and Valkur thank you for not taking them from me_ – and lying curled so close, skin to skin, as if they had been made to fit together like this.  And, in his heart, a deep pain seemed to ease: if Mercedes and Arnau could save each other against such terrible odds, perhaps that was all that mattered. With a deep, shuddering breath, Raül Riera found his strength again, and kissed Cecilia’s forehead. They were alive: that was all that would ever truly matter.


	4. Alcohol

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ain't no party like a Lafanese party, because a Lafanese party will keep partying until someone is (lightly) stabbed while dancing and you end up accidentally infiltrating enemy ships.

“Psst! Arnau!” Mercedes shook her brother again.

“Wha–?”

“Shh! Quiet!” She covered Arnau’s mouth as the man next to him in the hammock muttered in his sleep.

Herself, she was still warm from the arms of a very friendly night’s companion. Her clothes stank of smoke, sweat, at least three different types of alcohol, and other less decent scents. By all rights, she shouldn’t have had to put any clothes on until at least noon, hopefully even later. But she was up now, and very,  _very_  awake.

“Arnau, we are on a Viernes ship. Clan  _Viernes_.”

Arnau’s eyes snapped open, meeting her own with a look of entirely lucid terror. She nodded, biting her lip, and jerked her head at the door of the cabin.

Slowly, carefully, Arnau extricated himself from his companion’s hammock, while Mercedes hunted for his clothes. Once he was fully dressed, she cracked the door of the cabin, looking up and down the passageway.

Arnau joined her.

“How the  _fuck_ did we miss that this is a Viernes ship?” He shot a glance back at the man in the hammock. The sailor’s best coat hung on a hook on the bulkhead, the distinctive white and grey of the Viernes colours as plain as day.

“I don’t know! Shh!” Mercedes flapped her hand at him as a shirtless female sailor came shuffling down the hallway, probably heading to the for’rard companionway and to the heads. When she’d passed, they both crept out into the passage, following the way the sailor had disappeared.

 

In their defence, it had been a wild night. By report, it had apparently started with a drunken Isterian sailor implying that the Lafanese Islanders were little more than Vadaen slaves who’d found a few rafts and were no true sailors. As the inevitable ensuing barfight turned against the small Lafanese contingent present, one of them ran out into the street, bellowing in Lafanese for everyone to come and join the fun.

By happy chance, a large number of Lafanese ships had just put in to harbour that day, with plenty of prizes at their tails, disgorging swarms of happy sailors clinking with golden coins. Few Islanders went in for full-clan colours abroad, so absent any guide for clan politics, every Lafanese sailor within earshot had answered the call. Mercedes and Arnau had joined just in time to get in a few choice blows before true chaos broke. With reinforcements, the Lafanese thoroughly trounced the Isterian and his friends, expelling them into the street with insults about clanless  _xarnegos_  who wouldn’t know the cat from a cathead.

After that, the evening became a bit of a blur. Upon finding that the pub was now mostly Lafanese, someone had pulled out their guitar, another their _oud_ , and suddenly half the pub’s furniture was chucked out in the street to make room for the dancing. Some generous souls had produced bottles of anisette strong enough to peel paint off the decks, and soon everyone was shouting for knives so they could  _really_ get the party going in full swing.

 

In retrospect, Mercedes thought that was probably when they’d begun to make bad choices.

 

It was one thing to be friendly with fellow Lafanese abroad when there was no feud on, but it was quite another to go back to sleep on their ship. Especially Clan Viernes. She didn’t think they’d actually kill her and Arnau, exactly, but she also didn’t want to find out what they might do instead.

A pity, really. Her new friend had been extremely friendly, particularly for a Viernes woman.

Now, cautiously, Mercedes poked her head up the fore hatchway, looking around. The deck was quiet, empty but for one man heading aft. The ship was anchored head and stern about a cable’s length from the docks. If they made as if they were going to the heads, they could slide down the anchor cable into the water and strike out for the quay. It’d be a damned nuisance to swim in wet clothes, but there was no help for it, not if they didn’t want to walk through Flotilla naked.

Nodding to Arnau, she crept up the companionway, moving as quietly as she could before –

“Hey!”

Both Rieras wheeled around to find Arnau’s friend from last night standing there in his trousers.

“What’re you two doing?” He looked at Arnau. “Are you leaving?”

Mercedes froze in panic, but Arnau didn’t miss a beat. He shrugged, looking a little sheepish.

“I was leaving, yeah. I sort of figured that was the thing to do: there were a lot of drinks last night. But,” he slid an arm around the other man’s shoulder, flashing him a winning smile, “But if  _you_ don’t mind, I’m  _sure_ I could be persuaded to stay. My sister could –”

“Your sister?” The man’s eyes flickered to Mercedes and back at Arnau. “So where’re you two–”

“She could stay too, if you like,” Arnau purred.

That shut him up. Mercedes refrained from giggling at his expression only through superhuman effort, and desperately schooled her face into something she hoped looked appropriately wicked and lascivious. Through half-lowered lashes, she noticed that Arnau held his sheathed knife in his free hand.

“The more the merrier,” Mercedes said huskily, keeping her eyes on the Viernes man’s face. She stepped down the companionway, pulling at the laces of her blouse with one hand and extending the other for him to take. When he stepped forward, Arnau wound up and cracked him expertly on the back of the head with the hilt of his knife.

“That was great,” Arnau said later, as they paddled their way through the filthy water towards shore. “I almost thought you were going to take him up on it.”

“You’re insane and a deeply troubled man. I’ll pray for you.”


	5. Lights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A Harvest Night filled with omens and portents. (Snippet from the lengthy Halloween story.)

In proper Harvest Night fashion, the young folks of Lleida milled about in the water along the steps leading down from the town wall. Everyone was in their finest clothing, of course, and completely soaked, swimming and splashing at each other like children. The night was warm: the velvety air the same temperature as the black water of the bay. And the rituals of the Lafanese New Year were only just beginning.

Suddenly Arnau grasped Mercedes’ arm.

“Look! Here they come!”

Others in the sea and along the wall took up the cry, pointing south. People filed through the gate in the wall to line the sea steps, silently watching. A conch shell blared out across the waves, echoing off the heights above Lleida. And far, far out in the offing a single, pale light could be seen, bobbing on the sea.

The people still swimming edged back towards the shore, retreating up the steps; it was terrible luck to be in the water when The Dead and The Drowned rowed in to Lleida. The festival music faded away, with only the drums beating a steady deep rhythm, and a single, haunting  _duduk_ flute lilting out its ancient call over the town. The light advanced, and then there were more lights, glowing greenish as they came across the bay, shattered in myriad reflected ripples as they stretched out towards Lleida.

“I hate this part,” Mercedes said, backing away up the steps. When Arnau didn’t join with her, she hesitated, standing on the uppermost step with the waves tugging at the hem of her long black skirt. Looking back, she saw her brother still standing in the sea, staring out at the sickly lights as they grew ever nearer.

“Arnau,” she hissed, “Get out of the water.”

They were close enough that he must have heard her, and yet there he stood, staring, rocking slightly in the swell.

“Arnau, get over here!” Around her, people were beginning to murmur. And the lights bobbed closer.

“Arnau!” Her whisper cracked out like a whip, and still he did not move.

“Arnau, this isn’t funny! Get out of the water right fucking now!”

Mercedes’ hair stood on end as she stepped back into sea. Gritting her teeth and determinedly not looking at the lights, she waded towards her brother. He was standing tall, straight as a mast, gazing out towards the oncoming lights. Something in his stillness made her hesitant to disturb him, despite her fear.

“Arnau?” She asked in a small voice, “Whatever you’re doing, please stop it. Stop it now!”

His face registered no change. He only stood there, with the greenish lights reflected in his eyes.

In an agony of fear, Mercedes seized his shoulders in an iron grip, digging in her fingernails and hauling him backwards. Squawking in indignation, Arnau lurched out of his trance.

“Fuck! What the hell is wrong with you? Let –  _go_  –  Mercè!”

Mercedes bit her lip and heaved her brother bodily up the steps. Her flesh crawled as though the water had turned ice-cold. Arnau twisted in her grasp, spitting out curses: “Valkur’s balls, what the fuck is wrong with you?”

Mercedes adjusted her grip, seizing his red kerchief and hauling him up to his knees. She could feel the eyes on them, all staring, silently watching the exchange.

“What’s wrong with me?” She snarled in an undertone, “You tell me! You’re the one who was standing there like a freak while the Dead come in! Gods, if you ever fucking do anything like that again I will kill you, do you understand?”

Whatever had entranced Arnau, its effects vanished in a rush of confused indignation. He tugged at her hands, trying to get free.

“Shit, if I’d known you were such a superstitious old woman I’d have bought you a charm to protect against warts for your goddam birthday!”

She shoved him then, hard enough to send him sprawling to the ground with a sodden thump.

“Shut up and stand up. You shame yourself.” Mercedes’ hands shook: with rage, she thought.

Arnau quietly got to his feet and wrung out a corner of his shirt, not looking at her. The drums beat slowly on. He mutely held out his hand, and Mercedes took it, jaw clenched, staring straight ahead at the advancing lights.

Despite herself, Mercedes felt her anger diminish as people turned their attention back on the lights out beyond the arms of the harbour. She’d throttle Arnau later, but now – now, Mercedes shivered. Ever since she was a little girl, this part of the Harvest Festival had always frightened her. She swallowed and leaned in against her brother, comforted by the familiar warmth felt through wet clothes.

“Sorry if I scared you,” Arnau said quietly.

“You’d better be,” Mercedes replied, squeezing his hand. “You’ll have to clean the entire catacombs or something so you won’t have bad luck for the rest of your fucking life.”

She hesitated, then asked: “Are you alright?”

The boats could be seen clearly now: long, lean Lafanese craft, strewn with the wrack of the deep, with dark figures swimming between them. The reed flute sighed out over the water and, in the dying of the year, The Dead and The Drowned answered its call.

“I’ll be fine.”


	6. Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An end and a beginning.

Belowdecks, water rushed aft as the ship began its climb up the back of another colossal wave. Over the groaning timbers and shrieking wind, the shrill wailing of the bosun’s whistle could still be heard, and the cry passed on from sailor to sailor as men and women boiled up from below, thundering up the hatchways: “All hands! All hands! Starboard watch, on deck! All hands!”

Mercedes and Arnau tumbled out of their hammocks, throwing on heavy weather gear.

“Catch!” Arnau said, tossing Mercedes his red kerchief.

She caught it with one hand and whipped off her shawl, lobbing it at her brother. He doubled it up around his neck, shivering at the freezing wind that howled down the main hatch.

“Tie that thing tight,” he said, with the familiar storm-time witticism, “It’s a bit windy out there, and I’d hate to lose it; I look so good in red.”

Mercedes chuckled as they ran. “You think you look good in everything!” She called over the din of wind and wave.

“Well, I do!” Arnau shouted back. “If I get lost, make sure the wizard knows: he looks good in everything!”

They ran up the now nearly vertical hatchway and recoiled for a moment as they stepped out into the full fury of the gale, then immediately darted glances at the rigging. Everything furled but a scrap of storm stays’il and the main topsail, which was just high enough to keep them from being becalmed in the troughs of the titanic rollers marching from horizon to horizon.  Four of the strongest sailors wrestled with the wheel, heads bent against rain that came down so heavily one could hardly breathe. As they reached the top of a crest, packets of blown spray and spume came racing aboard like grapeshot, and the voice of the wind in the rigging grew even higher, wailing like the spirits of the lost.

Mercedes looked around her at the wild scene. The  _Voraç_  flew over the deadly sea like an avenging angel, shouldering aside the rough waters with a proud, fierce grace. The other ships of their group had long since spread out for safety, so it seemed as if they alone existed, sole witnesses to the gigantic majesty of the sea in all her furious glory.

Arnau leaned in close to Mercedes’ ear, cupping his hands around his mouth. “Fuck me!” he bellowed. She nodded, grinning.  _This_  was sailing.

“Reef topsails!” The command twittered out from the bosun’s pipes, and the woman roared into her speaking trumpet: “Larbolins man the topsail clewlines, buntlines, and weather topsail braces! Starbolins by the lee braces, bowlines, and halyards!”

Arnau gave Mercedes a quick, one-harmed hug, and then they joined the sailors running to their stations, slipping and sliding on the slanting deck, pulling themselves along by the lifelines.

“Idlers stand by to take in slack from the reef-tackles!”

Instructions flew thick and fast as the ship began to drop down into the trough of the wave. The otherworldly chaos on deck decreased in the comparative shelter, and Mercedes could see other sailors nodding and smiling at each other as they hauled on the weather braces, eyebrows raised: this was quite the storm. Then the cry came that Mercedes had been waiting for: “Aloft topmen!”

She and her fellow topmen – mostly the lighter members of the crew – swarmed up the shrouds, fighting against the steep, forward angle of the ship as she barrelled downwards. Up the shrouds of the main mast, scaling the 25-degree overhang of the futtock shrouds, clambering into the main top, and then on, up the topmast shrouds to the crosstrees of the topmast yard itself: 35 feet of slim, stout pine. There in the tops, a hundred feet above the deck, every pitch and roll of the ship was magnified so at times the deck lay beneath them, and at others they swung out at an angle, with nothing but air between them and the deadly sea below.

“Trice up! Lay out to take in a reef!” They inched out onto the yard, shuffling on the footropes. Even with only the lightest sailors aloft, the topmast creaked and groaned under the added weight, straining at backstay and braces. Frozen fingers pulled up bunches of the sail as the reef tackle did its work, diminishing the surface area of the sail. The deck below was fairly sheltered from the wind, but up here the gale buffeted them, tugging at their clothes, trying to pluck them from their lofty perch and hurl them into the sea. Nearly blinded by wind slanting into her face and by the hood of her heavy weather gear, Mercedes felt strangely isolated in the howling madness, with only glimpses of other brown hands pulling at the straining canvas to prove she did not struggle alone.

“Lay in! Stand by the booms! Down booms! Lay down from aloft!”

By the time the bosun piped them down off the mast, the difference in the ship’s movement was plain: with the area of sail diminished, they moved more slowly, but were in less danger of the topmast being carried away entirely by the wind.

Arnau gave Mercedes a clap on the back as she dropped on deck. She punched him back with one shaking arm, then looked in surprise at her hand as it pained her. In the midst of the work, something had pulled the nails of two fingers out at the root. Shaking her smarting handand cursing, she joined the other sailors clambering up the sloping deck to the shelter in the waist.

There she, Arnau, and the rest of the starboard watch huddled as the larboard watch was piped below to try to rediscover their frozen extremities. Then Mercedes noticed one of her fellow topmen running up to the bosun, who turned ashen under her olive skin, and ran to the captain. A flurry of commands brought the master on deck, and the capable old bastard shouted something in the captain’s ear that made him turn as pale as the bosun.

Then the call came: “All hands! All hands! Shoals dead to leeward!”

Mercedes and Arnau looked at each other, stricken.

“Oh fuck,” Mercedes said, and though Arnau couldn’t have heard her over the wind, he nodded.

They looked up at the reefed topsail, the only scrap of canvas they dared fly apart from the storm stays’il. The thrust those gave was minimal, almost nothing compared to the awful force of the swell. They could only hope to claw their way to windward for so long before they were thrown backwards upon the shoals. Even their best efforts could only delay the inevitable.

“If the topsail holds, we could turn her broadside on and try to row ashore under her lee,” Mercedes shouted. Arnau nodded. It was the only option, and only then if the wind didn’t strengthen and tear the sail or carry it away entirely.

The bosun’s pipe shrieked out for them to tack, with orders for the larborlins to get the boats ready on the davits. Topmen to prepare to go aloft to take in another reef.

Mercedes threw her arms around her little brother, squeezing him tight so he could feel it through the bulk of his weather gear. He hugged her back. They stood there together for brief moment, wrapped in the homelike closeness of each other’s arms. The storm howled around them, the peril of it suddenly far more real. 

On an impulse they kissed, trusting to the dark and the night to conceal unfraternal ardour.

Parting at last, Mercedes made an effort to smile. “Take care!” she yelled into his ear. “I love you!”

“I love you, too!” he shouted.                                  

They pulled each other close again, and Mercedes felt him kiss the top of her head and bury his face into her hair, as he always did. She pressed herself against him and held him even tighter, nestling into his oilskins until at last she heard the familiar beating of his heart as she lay her head against his chest.

The bosnun’s whistle called out again, and they broke apart.

“See you when this is all over!”

“That’s a promise!”

The two struggled up out of the waist, shading their eyes against rain and water.

“Topmen: away aloft!”

Arnau gave her hand one last squeeze, and then Mercedes ran for the shrouds. Looking down from the maintop, she tried to catch a glimpse of her brother, but he was indistinguishable from the mass of sailors hunched against the storm. Well, he wasn’t such a lubber that he’d be standing about gawping up at her, would he? The same should go for his sister.

With a shake of her head, Mercedes schooled herself to her task, swinging her feet into the ratlines of the topmast shrouds. To leeward, she could see an impossibly long line of dark shoals and the looming land. Off to windward, lightning arced through the roiling sky. As she and her companions reached the crosstrees, they felt the shuddering protest of the topmast through hands and feet. She shoved fear for herself and her brother aside, sliding out onto the yard.  _Just get the sail in and you can get back on deck._  Arnau would be safe. They’d get through this.

They always had.

 

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